پیشبرد درک و تفاهم: رویکرد زبان شناختی به شناخت شناسی گردشگری

Arguing that considerations of knowledge development should reflect a conversational, human-based view of knowledge production, this paper proposes a linguistic approach to understanding tourism epistemology. It then introduces a framework for exploring knowledge progression that includes the components of tourism morphology, or the creation and adjustment of concepts and models; the production and promotion of new interpretations and understandings; and the employment of such interpretations for the purpose of problem solving oriented to the needs of practitioners and policymakers. The paper concludes that scholars should analyze epistemological progress not only to comprehend the development of ideas and interpretations, but also as an exercise in reflectivity regarding the influence of academic forces and trends that govern the process of knowledge production.

Tourism studies is coming of age at a time when dramatic change is afoot in the broader domain of social research philosophy. Traditionally, social research existed largely under the sway of postpositivist philosophy, which holds the goal of research to be a systematic search for scientific truth. Thus, at one time it appeared easy to answer the question “How do we understand knowledge progression in social research?” Clearly, research was advancing if it was bringing us closer to truth, and clearly it was bringing us closer to truth if it met agreed upon standards of validity, reliability, generalizability, and so forth—standards which were, for the most part, borrowed wholesale from the “hard” sciences. The sweep of philosophical changes brought on by the resurgence of hermeneutics and critical theory–based approaches to knowledge production and by the development of postmodern and poststructural philosophies about the social world, however, has eroded the secure foundations of truth once taken for granted by “social scientists.” Echoing strains of reasoning about the subject in science that can be traced to early luminaries like Weber, Durkheim, and Marx, such “alternative paradigms”—which include interpretivism/constructivism (Gergen and Gergen, 2003, Schwandt, 2000 and Bochner, 2005), pragmatism (Noddings 2005), feminism (Oleson 2005), critical theory (Adorno and Horkheimer, 1944, Kincheloe and McLaren, 2002 and Ladson-Billings and Donnor, 2005), poststructuralism (Peters and Burbules 2004), and deliberative democratic theory (Howe 2003), among others—have argued forcefully that knowledge is a social product, created by communities of scholars that are governed by particular norms and traditions, and that notions of truth can not be disentangled from the broader realm of human interactions and power. In the study of tourism, Tribe (2006) captures this situation with his notion of the “knowledge force-field,” through which he argues that the path from tourism (the phenomenon under study) to tourism knowledge (the output of intellectual activities regarding the phenomenon of tourism) is mediated by factors traditionally considered to be “external” to science, such as researcher personhood and positionality, disciplinary norms, and broader societal ideologies. This conceptualization represents a break from traditional notions of scientific output as a neutral mirror of reality and exemplifies the way that social research disciplines and fields including tourism studies—albeit somewhat belatedly in comparison with other academic domains—are having to come to terms with the realities of knowledge production in a postfoundational world. In light of this emerging intellectual milieu, in which—despite the continued presence of traditional postpositivist hegemonies—alternative and diverse understandings are increasingly finding voice, a fresh discussion on the issue of knowledge production in tourism studies seems warranted. After all, if scholars of the same field, who exist side by side in the same departments, can not agree on foundations for truth—if indeed they can not necessarily even agree on what it is they are doing, or what they should be doing, when they engage in the study of tourism—then how can they hope to understand the way knowledge unfolds in their field? Given the fragmented roots of tourism studies and the difficulty of gauging the impact of tourism scholarship on other scholarly literatures (Graburn and Jafari, 1991, Harrison, 2007, Jafari, 2001, Leiper, 2000, Tribe, 1997 and Xiao and Smith, 2006), it is perhaps not possible to determine a single answer to the question of what constitutes knowledge progression in tourism. Nevertheless, as this paper suggests, it is worth pursuing understandings of how knowledge unfolds because doing so can contribute to scholars’ reflective capacity regarding the intellectual and educational products of the field. Epistemic inquiries about tourism studies also have important political implications, which stand as an additional valuable reason to pursue them. Following in the discursive, relational, power-referenced philosophical traditions to knowledge production of scholars such as Nietzsche, Durkheim, Habermas, Mannheim, Bourdieu, Marx, Gramsci, Foucault, Rorty, Sapir, and Whorf, this paper advocates for the consideration of tourism scholarship not as a linear search for truthful representation of reality, in keeping with any particular foundationalist scheme of evaluating knowledge progression, but as an institutionalized, norm-governed site of conversation in which interdisciplinary discourses about tourism are developed. In doing so, it engages a postfoundationalist epistemology. As opposed to foundationalist or objectivist epistemologies, which presume that knowledge is trustworthy and legitimate only when based on concrete foundations that “require no further justification or interpretation” (Schwandt 2007:120), this paper embraces the view that there is no secure agreement about what can be considered as a valid foundation for a knowledge claim in tourism studies because the field consists of heterogeneous philosophical (including methodological and ontological) perspectives. Postfoundationalism has its roots in the antifoundational thoughts of Friedrich Nietzsche who advocated extreme skepticism toward any truth claim (Babette, 1999 and Baronov, 2004). Generally speaking, Nietzsche argued that any given truth claim is no more than one ideologically driven way of representing reality, which is based on the intellectual act of imposing human reason to explain the phenomenon under investigation. Nietzsche thus negated any attempt to describe an ultimate reality in an objective manner and concluded that the goal of scientific research was to create language systems that metaphorically describe the world. This, he thought, was the only way that researchers, who view the world differently, would be able to communicate with each other. As shall become apparent, this approach to knowledge production is especially relevant to the epistemology of tourism studies due to the unique intellectual, historical, and administrative settings under which knowledge is produced in tourism. In keeping with Nietzsche’s logic, this paper assumes knowledge production to be a linguistic process—a complex negotiated communicative project, containing a multitude of paradigmatic, historical, methodological, and disciplinary influences—in which scholars from different backgrounds engage together (see also Chase 1956). This linguistic process is always conditioned by power, by the institutionalized setting under which it occurs, and by the rhetorical and textual constructions utilized by its producers. Arguing that the act of assessing progress in knowledge production in tourism studies should reflect this conversational, human-based view of knowledge production, this paper proposes a linguistic approach to understanding research progress that includes three guiding dimensions: tourism morphology, or the creation and adjustment of terms, concepts, metaphors, and models by tourism scholars; the production and promotion of new interpretations and understandings regarding tourism-related phenomena; and the employment of such interpretations for the purpose of practical problem solving oriented to the needs of practitioners and policymakers. The paper concludes that scholars should analyze development in the tourism studies literature not only to comprehend the movement of ideas and interpretations with regard to specific areas of subject matter and their utilizations in the real world, but also as an exercise in reflectivity regarding the influence of academic forces and trends that govern the process of knowledge production in tourism.

The notion that tourism scholarship is a product of a discursive process is appealing because of its recognition of the centrality of human actors; few scholars of any stripe would disagree with the view that language, at the very least, mediates knowledge production (some, of course, would argue that it is constitutive of knowledge production). Because of its insistence that discursive actors operate with reference to external norms and conditions, which thus shape the output produced, such a conceptualization is particularly well-suited to dealing with the political dimensions of knowledge production in interdisciplinary fields, and it is often invoked for such purposes. However, a knowledge production as ‘‘norm-governed conversation’’ framework has other benefits as well. Recognizing epistemic output as the product of a conversation between thinkers working from different paradigmatic stances, with different values, beliefs, and goals, is arguably more democratic than are more narrow conceptualizations that view knowledge production as a search for truth, with truth (and acceptable means of searching for it) being defined in terms of one particular regime of thought, which happens to dominate at a particular time (Mannheim 1952). To make such an argument is not to claim that perfectly democratic outcomes will inevitably result, in tourism studies or elsewhere: a simple look at the face of the tourism academy reveals many underrepresented voices and philosophies (e.g., Ateljevic, Pritchard, and Morgan 2007; Tribe 2006, 2008). Rather, such a framework opens the door to the possibility of greater democracy because it overtly recognizes epistemic progress as a socially negotiated, dynamically produced outcome created by interactions among reasoning beings. The framework offered here for understanding how research progresses in tourism studies seeks to move beyond narrow discussions of research quality. Such discussions clearly have their place: arguments about the appropriate use of a particular method or the proper interpretation of a given research outcome are useful because they allow scholars to think more deeply and critically about the knowledge products they create, and thus to produce more sound justifications for the value of their output for guiding problem-solving efforts in practice. However, as tourism studies becomes more established as a field—and a diverse and complex field it is—it is also important to consider notions of progress on a broader scale. The three dimensions of the framework proposed here thus aim to render the question of research progress easier for scholars to grapple with by identifying linguistic forms of advancement that cut across individual paradigms or areas of study. Such a framework can help to highlight important contributions that have previously been made to the literature, as well as areas that are in need of research attention. The notion of a more democratic approach to judging research advancement is appealing on a moral level, but there is even more to recommend it than that. Arguably, epistemic value inheres in deliberative democracy. As many have argued elsewhere, democracy is valuable because it preserves plurality and, hence, the resources embedded in that plurality—in the diverse perspectives, approaches, and problem- solving experiences of the members of a democratic community. Such an outcome will not logically ensue if one imagines democracy as a rather blunt, majority-rules, winner-takes-all sort of system. Nor will it occur if one imagines democracy as a blank check—a sort of ‘‘let every flower bloom’’ approach that allows individual thinkers to retreat into their own understandings of the world without having to bear the burden of butting heads in the forum of ideas with their fellow scholars, who may view the world quite differently. But democracy as conceptualized here—as an ongoing, deliberative, and hopefully respectful conversation that involves different parties with different views and that emphasizes evidence and argumentation but also open-mindedness and questioning of taken-for-granted assumptions and intellectual power structures—would seem, at least theoretically, to hold resources for deepening and complexifying approaches to and understandings of tourism phenomena. Scholars who engage in epistemology of social research often tend to emphasize the oppressive aspects of discursive formations (e.g., Foucault 1972)—the way the reigning values, perspectives, and interests of the day shape human understandings of truth and logic in particular contexts, inevitably leading to the advantaging of some parties at the expense of others. The dominant discourses in particular historical moments and spaces form the boundaries of how actors can make sense of things (Rorty 1989). They inform answers about how the world works by shaping the very questions that can be logically asked, as well as opinions about the best ways to approach answering them. What is less often seen, however, is how recognition of the discursive nature of knowledge production can function to improve society by inducing a sense of reflexivity in those who recognize such characterizations of power, language, knowledge, and truth operating in everyday practice. In this spirit, it is hoped that a framework for assessing research progress in tourism studies that is grounded in the idea of knowledge production as a negotiated conversation, and which reaches beyond narrow paradigmatic approaches to illuminate the multiple levels on which research contributions can be made, can help us to understand epistemic progress on a broader level and to recognize and preserve the value that lies in the field’s diversity. Any discussion on epistemological development can not be separated from the everyday level of administration (Foucault 1966, 1972, 1980; Mannheim 1959). Indeed, tourism departments that offer bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees need a sense of intellectual identity to enable them to provide programs at all levels. It would now be timely to examine the implications of such administrative issues for tourism epistemology. Future studies can begin by addressing several questions, including the following: Who has the power to determine whether research has advanced in a field with multidisciplinary sources? What knowledge products are considered to constitute epistemological progress, and when and how do they trickle down to curricula, position papers, and grant applications? How does the institutionalization of tourism studies influence knowledge production and advancement? These important questions are beyond the scope of this paper, but they should be pursued in the future because the implications of administration on knowledge production are undoubtedly far reaching. As a final note, it is important to address the fact that, despite the development of tourism curricula, journals, conferences, and themed-based communities, tourism studies still faces a crisis of legitimacy. This issue is a political problem, not an epistemological one, and it should be acknowledged as such. Those who seek to promote and sustain the academic development of tourism studies as an arena of interdisciplinary inquiry should thus be informed by a political consciousness. Championing more democratic approaches to understanding knowledge progression is one strategy that can help the community of tourism scholars (broadly conceived) in pioneering the difficult task of developing a collective political consciousness—a task that should also include other measures, such as the promotion of transparent political discussions among scholars and graduate students regarding the problem of the field’s legitimacy. Such discussions, especially perhaps with PhD students, can promote the idea that academic tolerance and at least a minimal level of solidarity are existential requisites for the future. In an era when departments are being closed or are merging on the grounds of lack of resources, tourism scholars from all branches should show solidarity, not necessarily on a theoretical or methodological basis, but certainly as a political tool against such sanctions. This paper suggests that in order to enable knowledge progression, it is necessary to maintain the academic conversation about tourism, a process which includes continuing to develop the tourism lingo, encouraging multiple interpretations of tourism realities, and fostering the creative transfer of such interpretations in order to solve practical problems.